


Paved With Stars

by EchoSilverWolf



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Completely gratuitous soft fluff, Crowley Created the Stars (Good Omens), Different take on how Halos work, First Kiss, I do not consent to my work being posted to other sites, It's just all kinds of soft, Kissing in the Rain, Love Confessions, M/M, Magical Realism of a celestial nature, Post-Canon, Post-Scene: The Ritz (Good Omens), Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:40:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21777583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EchoSilverWolf/pseuds/EchoSilverWolf
Summary: A feeling he'd know anywhere rushes over him like a tidal wave, like a dam bursting - stronger than he's ever felt it. So familiar, yet completely new. It is palpable; fierce and consuming. It's everywhere, all around them; on him, in him, for him - and it is hot and bright and burning and so beautiful.And it is loud. Crowley's love is so very loud.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 122
Kudos: 309





	Paved With Stars

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written anything in well over a year, and this is my first attempt in this fandom. I started this way back in the summer, but life and anxiety got in the way.  
>    
> Please feel free to come scream about these two idiots with me on Tumblr (EchoSilverWolf) or Twitter (@EchoSilverWolf).
> 
> I do not own these characters, I am only playing with them.

The thing about surviving one's own execution (even if one survived it while actually residing in someone _else's_ body) is that one feels not in much of a hurry to be alone afterward. So, if 'a spot of lunch' turns into tea, turns into supper, turns into copious amounts of wine...one really can't be blamed. Or if animated conversation turns to companionable silence, and a polite spacing of chairs turns to knees knocking, occasionally (and not at all uncomfortably) under the table, it's really to be expected...all things considered. 

However, with the sun having set ages ago, and the dim mood lighting abruptly turning to bright fluorescents (a not-so-subtle hint that the remaining staff is quite keen on going home), it seems they may have overstayed their welcome a bit. 

Crowley pays, as Aziraphale sets about making sure the wait staff will find a, frankly ridiculous gratuity beneath their last empty bottle of wine, and they make their way out into the late summer air, both quietly lost in their own thoughts. 

With no more Armageddon, no need for an arrangement, and not even any actual jobs to speak of anymore, for Aziraphale, the idea of parting ways for the evening is laced with a new kind of fear. They are their own side now, yes. No Heaven or Hell to answer to, at least for the time being. But where does this new freedom leave _them_? Meeting up for lunch now and again? Occasional nights drinking back at the shop? It doesn't really seem enough anymore. Going home, being alone, suddenly feels very unsettling. Not something he is terribly eager to be getting on with. It feels too much like a goodbye. And this train of thought seems like way too dangerous of territory to be heading into after hours of drinking.

He sobers himself up a little and it takes him a moment to notice that Crowley has stopped a few steps behind. 

"DUCKS!" he blurts out, snapping his fingers like he's just thought of something much more brilliant than water fowl. 

"We should...the ducks...the park. Just t'be sure, y'know, things are right... after…" he waves a hand about, uncoordinatedly, as if that would clarify the thought.

Aziraphale stifles a laugh, and shakes his head.

"Don't think there'll be any ducks at this hour".

"Must be. They can't all be asleep. What about...night ducks?"

Crowley's glasses have slid just a bit down his nose, the gold of his eyes just visible over the frames. With his head tilted, looking just this side of sloshed, he's frankly adorable. Aziraphale isn't sure when the word 'adorable' became part of his vocabulary to describe a demon, but there it is - the first one that comes to mind. He can't help but smile as affection bubbles in his chest. For once he decides not to tamp the feeling down. 

"Well, then, off we pop. It _is_ a lovely night for a walk. '' He turns in the direction of the park as Crowley stumbles a bit, trying to catch up.

"Perhaps you could sober up? Just a pinch? Would rather not end up fishing you out of the pond.” 

He can actually hear the eyeroll behind the dark lenses, but the demon's gait evens out some as they walk the short distance in an easy kind of quiet. The minutes pass with no sound save their own footfalls on the pavement, and the hollow echo does nothing to assuage his current melancholy.

It is his turn to realize he has lagged behind as Crowley cuts across the grass to stop right at the water's edge. He picks up his own pace to catch up, sidling closer to his friend than usual- as pulling a possibly still drunk demon from the water still ranks quite high on the list of things he would rather not do.

They stare out at the lights dancing over dark, still waters for a few moments, until Crowley breaks the silence with a sigh.

"No ducks." It sounds distant - almost sad. 

"No ducks,” he mirrors. 

He chances a glance sideways, unsure where they go from here. Crowley's head is tilted back, looking skyward, one hand twitching slightly at his side. He follows his gaze to the formerly clear sky and is rewarded with several fat raindrops on his face.

"Odd…it didn't even look like rain to-"

He stops short when the atmosphere around them ripples and shifts as obsidian-dark feathers unfurl over his head like a canopy, the tips of long primaries brushing over his shoulder.

" _Crowley"_ , he chastises. "What in creation are you doing? Put those _away_! What if someone were to see?!" 

"Look around, angel, there's no one here. Must've all had someplace better to be.” Crowley gives him an impish smile and a shrug before looking back out over the water.

Aziraphale makes a non-committal sound, his attention split between being preoccupied with Crowley's wings being out in plain sight, a bit more by the fact that he may or may not have 'persuaded' the entirety of the area to avoid the park...and _quite_ more than a bit by the feather currently tickling his cheek in the breeze.

He had always thought of Crowley's wings as being more or less similar to his own eagle-like plumage, just darker. Up close, however, they are actually very different. Sleek like silk (and oh, how he'd love to know what they feel like) and not solid black at all, as the street lamps and rain cause a bit of light to refract off their feathers like spilled oil. Tiny fractals of reds, and gold, of blues and greens. Like the fiery flecks in the rarest of black opal. The steadily falling rain sluicing off them like water off a duck. No, not a duck...a _swan_. Like a beautiful black swan. 

The gesture isn't lost on him either. A mirror to the first time they stood together, Crowley sheltered under his own wing on Eden's wall. So very long ago. He would have never imagined back then, that over time, they'd come together as they have; form the most unheard of friendship - possibly in all of creation. An angel and a demon, albeit neither were ever very good at their given titles. Hereditary enemies. Two opposite, contrary forces, that somehow managed to come to rely on and need one another. Complementary counterparts. Yin and Yang. 

With that errant feather still twitching against his face, Aziraphale's curiosity wins out over his normal sense of propriety, and he reaches up to touch, smoothing it back into its place. 

Crowley shivers at the unexpected touch, turning to look at him curiously. 

“Angel?"

"What were they like?" Aziraphale asks quietly, hands now absently preening, running through rainslick feathers, "in the beginning of things?” He's never really asked about _The_ _Before,_ but suddenly it seems very wrong that there is so much he doesn't know.

Crowley's eyes linger on Aziraphale's hands for a long moment before answering. His voice tinged with something that causes an empathetic tightening in his own chest.

"Were always dark, actually. Some of my lot assumed they burnt on the way down, but that's not how it went. They were...different, before, but always dark". 

He doesn't elaborate, and Aziraphale doesn't want to push. But now he wishes he'd known him then. He's only ever heard stories of the others, was still new when Lucifer was cast out, taking a third of heaven with him. Many were of a hierarchy far above his own. Her first Angels. The ones who helped _create._ He's often wondered who Crowley had been in heaven; what he might have done. He has never had the courage to ask and Crowley has never offered. 

Crowley stays silent, watching him intently out of the corner of his eye, an eyebrow arched above the frame of his glasses. He quickly looks away when he realizes he's been caught staring.

All of a sudden the moment feels very intimate. Full of the kind of terrifying tension he would usually turn and walk quickly away from.

But he's not afraid anymore. Not of outside repercussions at least. Their respective sides are afraid of them, and She...well, if She sees everything, and he hasn't fallen yet, She mustn't be all too concerned with the whole affair. And for once, he doesn't feel like running away from this strange pull between them.

"They're quite beautiful, you know,'' he muses, smoothing a few more wayward feathers back into place, then sliding a step closer.

Crowley makes a small, startled sound that breaks off abruptly when he shuffles even further into his space. Boldly. Daringly close. It feels heady, and reckless, and very much like standing on a precipice. One step more could send them tumbling over the edge of something that's felt like it's been coming for a long time. And, after all they've been through, he thinks perhaps he's finally ready to take _that_ fall. 

The thing about surviving one's own execution is that it makes one brave. 

Crowley goes preternaturally still as Aziraphale slowly, _slowly_ reaches out to remove his wet sunglasses. Slow enough for him to protest, to step back. He doesn't. So Aziraphale tucks the glasses away, safe, in his own pocket; lets his hand rest against cool, damp skin. This time he can feel the small shiver beneath his palm, as Crowley, almost imperceptibly, leans into the touch. His breath hitches as Aziraphale's thumb wanders _,_ tracing over the sharp edge of a cheekbone, ineffectively brushing at water droplets. Up a bit, to graze over the serpent sigil at his temple, and higher still to push a bit of rain-soaked hair away from where it has fallen over bewildered eyes.

He looks deceptively young like this, wide eyed and so terribly nervous. Confusion flitting across those beloved features. A silent plea for answers to unspoken questions.

His hand, still in Crowley's wet hair, tightens, and another gentle shudder trembles against his fingers. Unblinking eyes flick downward once then back just as quickly - amber irises nearly eclipsed by the ellipse of ink black pupils - and that's all the permission he needs.

It's so easy, really, like this. Their faces already so very close; humid, unnecessary breath mingling. So near to touching as it is, that, in the end, all he has to do is lean in a fraction closer, and tilt his head up just so, to tentatively press his lips against Crowley's. The most _human_ way to show a kind of affection that's nearly unheard of in their own kind.

And nothing happens to stop it. Neither of them burst into flames. Hell doesn't swallow him up. There is no angry lightning crashing down around them from Heaven. Nothing but the still soft sound of falling rain and the scent of petrichor. And a shock-sharp inhale, a stuttered whimper, against his mouth at the contact. 

They hover there, still and barely touching, and for just a moment he's afraid he might have overstepped. 

Oh, but then, _then_ Crowley's hands are on his face, dark wings folding tightly around him, and Crowley is kissing him back. That first, shy brush of skin becoming a crushing, desperate, needy thing. Long fingers twine into his hair; grasping, pulling, holding him as if he's afraid Aziraphale might disappear, might change his mind. 

When he parts his lips, Crowley whines against him. A small, broken sound, that he can feel, can _taste_ , as it ricochets throughout his corporeal and celestial bodies simultaneously. With it, a feeling he'd know anywhere rushes over him like a tidal wave, like a dam bursting - stronger than he's ever felt it. So familiar, yet completely new. It is palpable; fierce and consuming _._ It's everywhere, all around them; on him, in him, for him - and it is hot and bright and burning and so beautiful. 

And it is _loud_. Crowley's love is so very loud.

Like a storm on the sea it thunders and crackles and crashes against him. Waves cresting and breaking on rock. His own wings unfurl unintentionally from the sheer force of it, and he pulls back, wet and breathless, to stare in shock at an equally drenched and panting demon. 

How has he not felt any of this before? How long has it been there, repressed, and guarded so fiercely that he, a being of love, couldn't see - couldn't feel _-_ it?

"Oh _, Crowley_ ,” his voice waivers, rough and unfamiliar to his own ears. 

Crowley looks absolutely panicked, immediately diverting his eyes, and every ounce of his attention, to a puddle at their feet. 

"I...ah...s-ssorry...m'sssorry, 'Ziraphale," quiet stammering sibilants all the growing puddle gets in response.

"My dear, whatever are you sorry for?"

"M'too fassst...thisss...ssss'too _much_ ,” Crowley hisses, waving a hand between them both, but never looking up.

"Crowley? Crowley, look at me." He gently lifts the demon's chin as he adds more assertively, "l need you to look at me. Please?"

Red-rimmed serpentine eyes meet his in the faint glow of the lamp light, and Aziraphale's heart aches for what he sees in them.

"Right then, that...that's a bit better. Now, perhaps you didn't quite notice, but I…uh, was the one who...well, actually _did_ the...the kissing.” He offers Crowley a timid smile.

But Crowley still looks pained. Voice forced and barely audible when he finally speaks.

"Angel...please. Please don't... _"_ He trails off, but Aziraphale hears the words he doesn't say. Can see it in those star-golden eyes. 

_"Don't say something you don't mean"._

It breaks his heart to see so much vulnerability there. So much hurt, but something else, too. Something that looks very much like hope. But hope is a terrifying feeling when you have something to lose. And Crowley looks absolutely petrified. 

But, then, why wouldn't he be? Aziraphale has given him no reason before now to ever think his feelings were reciprocated. For millennia Crowley has always, _always_ done so much to show him, to say it without words. And what has he given in return? Even once he had acknowledged his own feelings, he has only ever rejected and pushed Crowley away. Out of fear, yes, but it was cruel all the same.

_We have nothing whatsoever in common._

_Run off together? Listen to yourself._

_We're not friends. I don't even like you._

He's done this. Put that doubt there where it doesn't belong. Time and again, Crowley's heart has been on offer and he has always turned away from it. Never showing any sign that he felt the same. And that's something that needs fixing immediately.

So he reaches, digs and pulls at every bit of it he has inside himself. Drops every wall, every barrier he's ever built to close it off. Half a century's worth of buried feelings (a lot longer if he's honest with himself). It's an almost ridiculous idea, but it _might_ work. He may still be capable of feeling it. At least like this - in its concentrated form. 

Never breaking eye contact, he cautiously reaches out to place his palm against Crowley's chest. He focuses it all, gathers it up into one simple thought. Everything he's never been brave enough to admit, and lets it drop like a miracle. 

The effect is instant. Crowley physically startles, eyes wide, as one hand comes up to cover Aziraphale's where it still rests against his now rabbiting heart. His face does a complicated little dance of expressions, ending in a silent "oh.”

And now that he's allowed it freedom, love erupts, overflowing, in Aziraphale's chest, seizing sharp and painful for every rejection he's given and any doubt he'd ever put in Crowley's mind that he was not loved in return.

Tugging at a slender wrist, he pulls him forward. Crowley who comes, willing and pliant, to bury his face against his neck. Aziraphale's hands nestle into the downy feathers at his back, and he rests his head against the damp embers of Crowley's hair. Pale wings encircle dark. The world outside spinning on as time slows to a halt inside a feathered cocoon. 

Crowley burrows into him further, and his own hands tighten around his slender frame. They stay that way for several silent minutes until Crowley breaks the quiet with a timid huff of a laugh.

"Didn't know you could _glow,_ angel."

And there is, in fact, a soft light emanating from him when he opens his eyes. Illuminating the enclosed space around them. His breath catches as it flickers and refracts off the arch of ebony wings. Thousands of tiny shimmers and sparks, forming galaxies and constellations in the midnight canvas of Crowley's feathers. His own halo somehow lighting up that little bit of grace that neither Hell nor time was able to extinguish. A reflection of the past cast in the light and shadow of their embrace.

" _Oh_!" He exhales against Crowley's hair, "Your wings! Oh, Crowley, _look_!"

A muffled objection vibrates, hot on his skin, but Crowley shifts ever so slightly; and when that same heat-damp breath cools as it's sharply taken back, Aziraphale knows he's seen it, too. Fingers tighten like a vice in his scapulars, and Crowley's whole self trembles against him.

"I...how...that's not _...what did_ _you_ _do?!"_

And Aziraphale lets him break, allows him this moment to be vulnerable. Tucks him up, tight against his own chest. Let's him shake apart, while he himself gathers up an eternity of shards and broken pieces, gentles them back together with soft touches; with nonsense sounds, and maybe just a small miracle. 

"I think, perhaps, my halo _,_ my _love…"_ Crowley tenses against him "... it's somehow lighting up _yours._ "

He spreads his wings and Crowley hesitantly stretches his own out where he can see. They watch as the now open space dims the ethereal glow; as star-dust and halos twinkle and shine for a few moments before flaring bright, like supernova, and finally both fading out. Leaving them, still entwined, in the darkened park.

Crowley sniffles, and Aziraphale smiles when he burrows back against his collar. He won't call it nuzzling (it absolutely is). 

"Rain'sss ssstopped, angel” he whispers, as reality settles back into place. 

Aziraphale looks up to a firament full of stars and satellites set against a now unusually clear London night. 

"Crowley? Did you...it was you, wasn't it?" He nods slightly toward the sky.

"S' just rain, no one will even notice.” The sheepishness is audible in his voice, and Aziraphale loves him even more for what _that_ implies.

"Not the rain,” he lets his fingers twist and tangle in Crowley's hair. Tugs just hard enough to get him to lift his head. 

"The stars, were they yours?"

"Told you, angel... _that_ was a long time ago".

"Oh, darling, so many things were _a long time ago,_ it doesn't make them less important, or any less beautiful.”

Slender hands, more confident now, come up to tenderly frame his face.

"I'd have paved the ground beneath your feet with them, if I could. Would've created constellations in your name if you'd have let me. I- _I love you_ , angel, I never actually said". Crowley nudges forward. Stops just shy of touching; a question without words. Still holding back, still so careful. And Aziraphale leans in just enough that their noses brush; a wordless reassurance.

_You are welcome here. Always_. 

He lets Crowley be the one to press them together. It's softer this time, but filled with lifetimes of unspoken things. When finally they break apart, it's only enough to rest their foreheads together. 

The thing about surviving one's own execution, is that it makes one realize that some things are worth _every_ risk.

And that some things, the really important ones, should never be left unsaid. 

He has millenia worth of things that still need saying, but one thing that needs saying _right now._

"My dearest, you've _been_ saying it for so long, and in so many ways! Let me...let me say it back, now, and until the end of all things, my love... _my_ angel."

The next time they manage to pull apart there are pink and orange rays of dawn flickering on the water...and ducks. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> 


End file.
